I'm definitely going to do this this year, could it be done in a day, travelling included?

The Quiraing? Hmm.

1. Fit flat pedals.
2. Don't start the ride from the top car park. Park down across from the cemetery and push up from there, you'll miss the horrible crevasse near the start that gave us conniptions and miss most of the unrideable stuff too.

The trouble is, if it's a nice day, you'll be stopping all the time for pics.

I think a day trip would be pushing it, or limit your ride a little - Googlemap travel times were bang on (5 hours from dundee to staffin, longer from salcoats) I could have saved some time on the a9 by going faster but it was the other roads that are slow going, constantly stuck behind slow moving cars with nowhere to overtake. Mid week might get rid of some of the traffic but you then get trucks in your way.

Quiraing: The offroad ride its self is very short, and to be honest if it wasn't a nice day it wouldn't have been so much fun.
It took us so long because we stopped to admire the views so much, it is a nice hillwalk and we did miss some of the good bits because we had bikes and were a little short on time, getting the path right and not having puctures would have made the decent a lot better though.
Personally I would start at the top despite my vertigo issues but you do need 2 of you to cross the gap. The last climb although tough felt like a real achievement.

Flat pedals are a must, and I'll be taking 30m of rope and some carabiners next time

You would be constantly unclipping, for safety as much as anything else, some of the paths are very narrow - 8 inches so. Occasionally you foot your self along so you can stay on the bike. A full suss would handle the waterbars and rocks a lot better, they were the cause of puctures among the unskilled The sides are much steeper than they look but then I'm a feardy. How they rode down some of those slow sections is incredible.

Night before and wild camp at the top would be fun, watching the HandI video though you can see them going back over the same ground again and again, filmed form different angles, lets you see how much A to B riding there is, and although we treated it as such it isn't the best A to B trip and is more of a play area to find routes in. If I went back I would want to wander more and find more of the fun bits they did.

You know, if it was me doing it again, I'd be inclined to do the following:

- Get up there the night before, camp at Sligachan
- Up bright and early, pack up tent. Sligachan to Camusanary. Then back out the way you came to Sligachan. 16 miles, no road, no bog, all the good riding.
- It's now mid-afternoon. Quick lunch and 45 mins in the car to the Quiraing. Fit flat pedals to the bike.
- Do the Quiraing if you've still got time. Again, I'd skip the first section, since it's mostly hike-a-bike unless you have a screw loose or your name is Hans McAskill. It is possible to get your bike over the crevasse single handed (Mr P did it), but it's pretty ropey (see my facial expression above).

I think Sligachan is the much better ride. The first two miles (ish) are a bind, especially if you're anything like me and it takes a while to find your groove. The entire ride is really rocky, doesn't flow well at the start and you need to commit to the water bars, shifting your weight back and forwards to get the front/rear wheels over - it was really tiring, since they're incessant at the start. When it does start to flow it doesn't give you a break either - you need to be constantly on, picking the right lines over and around the rocks.

There isn't much up or down, more like short, sharp rocky climbs and descents. Pick bike and tyres accordingly. While it's rideable rigid (and Singlespeed as Jamie demonstrated), you'll enjoy it much more with some front bounce as a minimum. I think we were really lucky the weather was so good, it'd be a very different proposition in the wet.

By the time we reached Camusanary, I was really enjoying it. It's not particularly fast, but it is challenging, and I really felt a lot more comfortable with all the rocky stuff by the end.

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